Keep Yourself Warm
by Butterfly Heart
Summary: Between blue smoke and the dusty light of morning Francois remembers an old, unfinished love and wonders if there was ever anything good to it. /FrUK


_**Keep Yourself Warm**_

It's a nice night.

The lights of his beloved Paris let the city seem more like a field of sparkling, glittering fireflies, the shapes of the houses hidden in nocturnal shades and a gentle breeze blows through Francois' bedroom window. He sits on the windowsill, mostly naked, only with a frilly, fancy dressing gown thrown around his shoulders and blows cold, cold blue cigarette smoke out into his night and somewhere behind him sleeps Arthur, entangled in sheets full of sweat and blood and mixed emotions.

He still doesn't understand why Arthur can't just fuck off, why he always comes back for more and why he himself never turns down a chance to humiliate him even if it means to lose all he ever has loved.

(He doesn't love Arthur at all, not by the meaning the word "Love" has for Francois. Maybe he doesn't love him in any other meaning, too.)

He feels his mouth curve up to a bitter smile and considers throwing Arthur out of his bed, of his house. Leaves it be. Lets grey, grey ashes flutter down onto the floor, looks out of the window and marvels at what his beloved people can create out of just some stones and passion. Arthur never understood the concept of passion at all; all he has is fierce determination and energy, not passion. Not Love, not to the world outside of him. That's why his food is always burnt

(_because you cannot cook really well without passion_)

and he had driven away the colony that loved him most and more sincere than every other nation ever had managed to love Arthur

(_because you cannot love someone properly who can never really return it by expressing his love except you're as fucked up as Alfred is)_

And he will always, always be alone.

_(Because Love is a concept that's really hard to understand for someone who seldom leaves more behind than ashes to ashes.)_

Grey, grey ashes flutter down onto the floor and blue, blue smoke whirls swiftly up into the air and he watches them and, for the first in a long, long time

_(You _are _old after all, older than many other nations.)_

_(Sometimes you think it's not a bad thing having seen everything the world can do to you-)_

_(-at least nothing can smash you anymore, shake you to the grounds, because you already lost the human you loved most and you already loved the protégés you loved most and it's fine, _they're _fine- _Seychelles such a beautiful darling and sweet little Mathieu a quiet force, both lively and hopefully happy_- and you'll never be the same-)_

_(-but on the other hand, you're too old to always stay the same.)_

Empty.

He doesn't know if Arthur and he himself ever had _something_, _anything _that's even near to being real and good and passionate, something between grey, grey ashes

_(red, burning flames and you'll never forgive him, oh no, you'll _never _forgive him)_

And blue, blue smoke

_(a Parisian café at night, people laughing and living around you and green, green eyes locked into yours, a little smile, the taste of rich red wine on your lips, a forceful kiss)_

And something that's not lingering and unfinished and unsatisfying,

_("I swear, I swear I'll burn Paris in the, ah, oh God, in the fucking ground" and you laugh and laugh and fuck him senseless and dream of bombing London-)_

_(-and there shall be no tenderness between them, no fondness or gentleness, just raw flesh on flesh and teeth upon teeth, one tear for another-)_

_(-centuries and centuries and you shall never be too old to participate in this)_

But he can't remember and he doesn't want to, too. _I'm too old for that shit_, he thinks and smiles, because it's true, but Francis never was one to hold onto truth and things given by a higher instance. He rather _is _the higher instance.

_(Maybe you're sad about how things are between you and him.)_

_(Maybe deep down, somewhere at the core of your heart.)_

_(You don't know.)_

_(You don't know if you want to know, at all.)_

It doesn't matter anyways. Maybe Arthur will wake up soon and he will dress and leave without another word, without looking back at Francois, sitting on that windowsill in a fancy, frilly dressing gown. Maybe Francois will make him breakfast and they will constantly bicker during it and maybe he will sit here forever, clouded in blue, blue smoke and ashes to his bare feet and grow colder and colder until he is like marble because he never was good at keeping himself warm all alone.

_(And Arthur is too cold to warm him up for longer than some minutes)_

It doesn't matter. He will watch the sun rising above his beloved city and he will smile and breathe and live and let things simply happen.

(Because that's life and he is too old and too passionate to wither and die.)

That's what he always does, anyway.


End file.
